Point Seven: Document and Redress 200 years of State Discrimination in Hiring and Contracting

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North Carolina should commission historical documentation of its contracting practices with racial minorities to justify constitutional redress.

REV Barber: For most of the State’s 220 year existence, the state of North Carolina has exploited Black labor and discriminated against Black businesses to the benefit of White-owned businesses. Here are Brother Farad Ali, Sue Perry Cole, Keith Sutton, and Andrea Harris to break it down:

Farad Ali: DID YOU KNOW our oldest State Agencies—the University in Chapel Hill and the small set of public agencies run by the Governor--—used slaves to do much of their labor, paying them nothing for 70 years? DID YOU KNOW that for many years the Department of Transportation used convict labor, mainly Black men who were Guilty of nothing but being poor, on the road gains, paying them nothing?

Keith Sutton: DID YOU KNOW that for the last 60 years or so since WWII, when a few Black businesses were able to try to get contracts with the State, the State never has agreed to giving more than 3-4% to Black owned business, although we constituted over 30% of the available labor and business pool after the Civil War. DID YOU KNOW that the Supreme Court found, in Croson v. Richmond, that N.C. could address its clear-cut history of past race discrimination against Black businesses by doing a historical and statistical study of its history that would justify thoughtful programs to redress its past economic crimes?

Andrea Harris: We demand the legislature fund a team of historians and statisticians to carefully document the 200+ years of state discrimination in hiring and contracting. We demand the legislature Retain national experts who have successfully advocated for and implemented specific set-aside programs for racial minorities, so they will zealously defend this program in court from the inevitable challenge of big white contractors and their trade organizations that established and benefited from a state-sanctioned white set-aside system for generations.

We Demand the State fund special support centers at Community Colleges and HBCU’s throughout the State to help minority-owned businesses get incorporated, help bid on jobs, get insurance, and other paper work so small Black contractors can quickly take full advantage of the new business opportunities.